Belle got up a little later, and she yawned as she looked around. She didn't notice Temmy's absence immediately, since her own fire lizards had hatched only two days before. She'd managed to get a gold and a brown, and had Impressed both. No one else had really wanted to Impress one, since they were a lot of work.

The brown one cheeped from its place curled around one shoulder, while the gold opened her eyes lazily, sprawled across the back of her neck. Belle soothed them both absently, going over to her little stash of meat for her two black holes, starting to cut it up into suitably sized chunks. Then she finally noticed that she hadn't gotten her normal morning greeting from Temmy and looked around.

Then she finally noticed Andy and Lien. She refrained from going over just yet, though. That might be a little too much right now. But she did look from a distance.

Andy was cooing softly over the black dragonet when he woke up and blinked his blue eyes at her. He looked at her for a minute before looking up at Lien and asking something in Chinese. Lien replied in the same language, and the dragonet looked back at Andy.

"You are my parents' trainer?" he asked. His words were perfectly coherent, something that Andy wasn't quite expecting, regardless of the books.

"Yeah," she replied after a moment. The dragonet stared at her again.

"Is there any food?" he finally asked, tilting his head to the side curiously. Before Andy could answer, she heard the distinct sound of wingbeats, and Temmy landed next to Lien, a few fish in his claws.

"Yeah, I think so," Andy replied. She looked up at her adult Temeraire. "Morning, Temmy. Thanks for letting me know ahead of time."

"It was late," Temmy replied, setting a fish down for the dragonet. Andy made a mental note to come up with another nickname for the younger Temeraire. "We did not want to wake you."

Belle fed her own two, who then prompty fell asleep curled up on her, before she started searching around to see what was going on. It took her a few minutes, but then she finally saw the fish and Temmy and the little black spot against Lien. She approached cautiously, stopping a good little ways away so as not to piss off the dragons.

"Looks like we've got three new additions," she said with a grin. The gold opened her eyes long enough to look at the dragonet, cheep, and settle herself more firmly around Belle's neck.

"Look how cute," Andy said, grinning. She was very nearly squealing. Okay, so she was fangirling a bit, but she didn't care. The little Temeraire was adorable, and looked completely cuddly. The dragonet ignored the trainers, more focused on the fish he had been given.

Belle did a little cooing herself, which annoyed the gold enough to poke her neck a few times.

"Yes, darling, I still love you more," she assured the little fire lizard. Who gave the black dragonet a dirty look and secured her little claws firmly around Belle's shirt and in her hair. Because this little gold was, apparently, extremely possessive. Eh. Oh well.

"He's so cute... Hey, think he'll grow as fast as Temmy did in the book?"

Andy opened her mouth to answer, but Lien beat her to it.

"Yes," the white dragon answered simply. Andy closed her mouth again. That answered that question, then.

"Well. Good thing we've got lots of food." Belle grinned briefly. She figured her little two wouldn't be waking up any time soon, so instead she decided to sit down for a bit, curiosity winning out over manners about not staring at people. Or dragons. Same difference.

"It is a little more complicated than she implied," Lawrence broke in. "He will grow rapidly, until a certain point, after which he will pause until he reaches his next stage." He was familiar with the process, having been partnered with the adult Temeraire for a while. It kind of made sense to Andy.

Belle nodded. She'd come across something similar before, so she had no trouble grasping the concept.

"So, basically, he's going to be like any other newborn." She snorted. "Except I think his growth will be a little more marked than these two."

"Considering he has to go from this," Andy gestured to the little dragonet, "to this," she gestured to Temmy, "I would say so." She grinned. "You know, only another thirty tons or so."

"Oh yeah, only." Belle snorted. "Whereas these guys probably won't get too much heavier. I know that when they're full-grown they can comfortably perch on a shoulder, so they'll get longer and bigger, but not heavier. Easier flying for them."

Andy snickered.

"Just think, one more giant black dragon," she said. "That must be a record, having so many dragons in one place outside of the territory."

Belle snorted, rather amused by that thought.

"Yeah, especially if one of us gets dragons from another territory, like the Anne McCaffrey." She grinned. "Because dragons are freaking awesome."

Andy nodded, grinning.

"Dragons are awesome," she agreed. "Which is why I originally got myself two of them." She glanced at the pair, and at the little dragonet who was asleep again against his mother. She hadn't brought up the subject of catching him yet. She would wait a while, to let Temmy and Li Li get used to there being three of them, first.

Belle grinned and entertained herself with thoughts of getting a dragon of her own, from one of various series she knew of that had dragons. A gryphon might be kind of awesome too.

But she stashed those thoughts away for later, instead just creeping back a bit to let them all rest. That way she could go dote on her lizards and check them over and so on and so forth.

Andy backed off for a bit as well, letting her dragons get settled again. She figured that the three would be a bit anti-social for a few days, at least until the dragonet got used to how things worked in the group. After that, Andy would see about nudging things back closer to normal.

That night, Andy sidled up to Saetan, the next volume of the series in hand.

"How's the book?" she asked, grinning.

Saetan glanced up at her, one eyebrow quirked. "Interesting," he said after a few moments of silence. "Curious."

"But not in a bad way," Belle interjected.

"No," Saetan agreed. "Not bad. Merely interesting."

"I've been reading it for a long time," Andy said. "I think I was thirteen when I first stumbled upon it." She grinned. "And there are some things that can never be lived down."

Saetan snorted at that. He already had some ideas what she might be referring to, and he couldn't help but be rather amused. He had much, much better stories that pertained specifically to these two. But oh well.

"I've got a little dirt on everyone," Andy said. She was still grinning, she couldn't help it. The mere thought of the books made her smile. "A lot on some people." She held up the second book. "Just be careful when you get to this one, it's falling apart a little. I had to tape some pages back in."

Saetan nodded and took the book, leafing through it quickly while he started thinking of a better way to repair the book. Living with Jaenelle tended to make anyone start thinking of new ways to do things. Just because you hadn't done it before didn't mean it wasn't possible.

"Let me know when you want the next one," Andy said. She knew she read a lot faster than most of the group, so she had a hard time accurately guessing when someone would be done reading something. Turning, she went to go and bother Kaelas. He needed brushing again.

Saetan nodded, already going back to the beginning while still turning the problem over in his mind. He liked puzzles, and if he thought about Jaenelle's way it was just another puzzle.

Belle snickered when she saw Saetan quickly becoming engrossed in the next book and shook her head, settling down. She knew she'd have to start figuring out what to do for dinner soon; staying in one place helped her to do something new almost every night for dinner. Which she loved.

Andy was working on brushing out Kaelas. It had been a while since she'd done it last, and she was working a lot of burrs out of his fur. She found it amusing that he was sprawled out on his back, though.

Belle fixed dinner and brushed out Dejaal again, just for the heck of it, before she sprawled out with a book for the rest of the night after feeding her two little lizards again. She didn't expect anything to happen, at least nothing big, so she was just hanging out.